Laughing Gas
by I-am-The-Mathgoth
Summary: A girl creates a campaign to support the Batman in his efforts...and attracts the city's greatest threat himself...rating changed a bit. Also...this is based on the The Batman cartoon universe. Yes it has an OC. I promise it doesn't suck. Chapter 3 up.
1. Fangirl

_Intro chapter...the next one will have less narration and more action. Yeay Batman!!_

* * *

It began as a project in high school; we were supposed to pick a hero, real or imaginary, and write up a little history on them, make some posters, use glitter and hot glue and, you know, whatever. You know how kids like being creative. I chose the Batman, and from the way my teacher acted, it was like I had picked Hitler or something.

He wasn't "appropriate". Which, I guess I sort of understand now. I mean, back then, he was just like, this mysterious menace to society who occasionally stopped a few robbers and like, the Joker if he managed to escape again. This was way before he ever got the massive cult status he does now. I mean, before I did research, I thought he was an actual BATman, like the rumors of alligators in the sewers. People claim to have seen him like they claim to have seen flying saucers.

So I researched. I went online, I stole newspapers from garbage cans, I had my little sister draw her interpretation of him, and compared that to newspaper clippings that sorta had him on film…you know, blurry, vague shapes. You get a head, some ears, and, naturally, the long flowing cape. Did you know it's weighted down at the hem, so he could use that as a weapon too? Like throwing a big black net over someone's head, and you know, its usually night time, so now they have this giant man in a suit kicking their asses AND they can't even see anything. Double whammy.

Anyway, I got so into it that even after I had gotten my A+ on the project, I continued to follow the news on him. Every time another villain was cut down by this guy, they'd have him on the front page of every paper, with some threatening caption. _DERANGED BAT MAN STALKS CITY CRIMINALS_ and all that stuff. This was even before they put the two words together…he was the bat man, but not THE BATMAN that he is today.

When I began college, I started another project. Having followed him for about a year and a half, I started a website devoted to his identity. It's gone now, but it was a massive forum with members all over the city speculating on his identity. They had so many theories…he was an alien sent to protect the city, he was a mutant crime fighter (like the Ninja Turtles…but they're another story altogether), and my all-time favorite, he was a vampire who happened to fight crime to repent for past sins.

Whatever he was, he was absolutely DIESEL and I couldn't get enough. He began to appear as a real person after a while, and the pictures became more common, people saw him on a daily, or nightly, basis. More criminals appeared too. Not just Joker, but people like the Penguin, or Catwoman. Minor criminals stopped making so much trouble. The jail was filled every night.

I started the Support the Bat campaign later that year. I made necklaces, simple hemp deals with a clay bead in the middle, his sigil. I made t-shirts that I ordered offline by the dozens. I made flyers. I gained interested people. People sent me pictures they had taken, real ones, not just black and white newspaper clippings. For the first time, I saw what he might REALLY be…I carried a camera around with me all the time. I donated the money I made to police charities since I had no way of presenting them to Batman himself. I wanted our police force to be better, so maybe, Batman didn't have to work so hard, doing their jobs. I was known.

Life changed once his legend was secured. Joker's signature weapon, that gas, was sold in small pill form to take like a drug to teenagers in clubs. Really, it was a small, green pill with a stripe of purple that was the actual drug, while the rest was a filler because a little goes a long way. Your body can't handle too much…but a small dose like that forces you to be happy for a few hours. Or, you know, something, I never took one willingly anyway. I was supporting Batman, not his deranged nemesis.

Everyone knew me eventually. I was loud, I had websites, I had t-shirts and buttons and necklaces, flyers, I even signed a few autograph books. People sent me letters asking for requests for jewelry mostly. They wanted a specific necklace with the Batman sigil on it, I made it, charged them for materials (or, nothing if they send me real good information), and used what money I didn't donate for more supplies.

Then one night, I got a letter with no return address, signed by "Mr. J", asking for a Joker necklace. I politely wrote back that I wasn't going to use his image in my campaign. Come to find out, it wasn't just the good citizens of Gotham that knew me. I had attracted some bad characters.


	2. Mr J

_I tried to write in-character Joker dialogue, so, tell me if I failed miserably. I like critisism as much as compliments, so feel free to tell me how much I suck. :)_

* * *

It was the weekend after the Mr. J letter and I was sitting at home eating Chinese food. I had the next day off, so it was around 2 am. My plan was to finish "dinner" and start in on some new arrivals I had gotten in the mail that week. People send me their own logos and designs sometimes, and ask for samples, as though my entire purpose was the damn necklaces or t-shirts. I do them when I have time or am particularly low on money...my campaign remains pure AND I make a little extra money on the side.

I had my corner desk set-up ready; bags of clay, beads in yellow, black, grey and white, miles of hemp, bottles of that popular new energy drink...you know the one, the green, florescent stuff that tastes less like bubblegum and vomit and more like soda and vomit? I rely on those to get me through busy nights. I was awake as late as I could afford it these nights. Another thing me and my hero had in common.

So it was exactly 2:13 (I had checked my digital clock the minute I finished my lo mien) when I sat down on my chair and began to cut my hemp. My doorbell rang.

Okay, I've been seeing some pretty terrible stuff lately on the news, you know? I was following the career of someone bent on destroying EVIL in the city, and therefore, have seen my fair share of violent crime photos...these criminals weren't just out for some good-natured robberies with heartwarming messages and "dark-humored tomfoolery", as my grandma called my sisters and my exploits when we were kids. These people took lives, ended, ENDED people, forever, and just for the sake of their own gain...or amusement. Violently. Nightmare inducing violence. Things that you can't even put into words, especially if you watch forensic shows (like I did) and are numbed to the language of death; "gored", "brutal", "slashed", "corpse"...words that mean something completely different when you see them for yourself.

But I digress...the point is that when my doorbell rang, especially at 2 in the morning unannounced, when everyone I knew had a cell phone, I felt like I was in those movies where the lead female is about to open the door for the killer while the audience behind the fourth wall is screaming at her to not do it. I didn't get up, and waited for whoever it was to call. The doorbell rang again after a minute or so. Now I definitely wasn't gonna open the door. In fact, if they didn't leave, I was gonna call the police.

Problem was, before I could even get up from my table, my door exploded off its hinges. Literally, blew off like in a fireball of wood and metal, and sent a wind of hot, scalding air into my face. I was so startled (though, "startled" couldn't possibly begin to explain what I felt), I fell over in my chair and knocked my head on the carpet. Not hard, but enough that I got dizzy for a second and the room spun, while my face and arms still stung a little from the burning door.

I heard an annoying high pitched wail that got louder and choppier, and by the time I felt I was able to sit up, the sound turned into a hysterical laugh. The smoke settled on the bottom of the floor, and was kicked up into swirls by a pair of bare feet.

"Hiya, kiddo," said the laughing voice, "was I interrupting dinner?" He swept an arm over the kitchen table, knocking the remains of the Chinese food on the floor. My plate shattered and brought me to my senses. I opened my mouth, expanded my lungs, and before I had the chance to form the scream, the Joker lashed out a hand, and suddenly a horrible throbbing filled my nose and mouth, my head snapped back until I saw the ceiling, and I guess that's around the time I utterly passed out.

I woke up feeling only vaguely attached to my body. I felt my head, the headache, while was good because pain means I wasn't dead yet. I felt a little of my torso...my heart beating in a thundering rhythm in my ears. I couldn't feel my arms. Couldn't feel my legs. And something was tickling my face.

I sat up as much as I could, ignoring the rush of blood to the back of my head when I lifted it up, and found that I was, more or less, sitting up. No, I was lying up. My head thundered in pain and I must have moaned, because the lights immediately flickered on into my eyes. I could FEEL my retinas melting off. I shut my eyes and turned my head to the side.

"Wakey wakey," said the voice, no longer actively laughing but hinting at it under the lower pitch he was using, "eggs and bacey." Strong fingers grasped my face and wretched up it until I was looking at the back-lit silhouette of "Mister J". I whimpered.

"Does it hurt? Hmmm?" he asked, in a half-sincere voice. When I merely blinked tears out of my eyes and tried to protect them from the harsh light instead of answering, he let go of my face and stepped away. I could hear some gears whirling someplace, and suddenly I felt like I was tipping forward. My head fell. My arms came back to life and god, did they hurt. I realized they were somewhere over my head, kept up by a band of something hard and cruel squeezing my wrists together. Not crossing the wrists, mind you, but squeezed together, back to back, twisting them in a possible but painful angle. I was laying on a table that resembled a rack. Now I was utterly upright and the weight of my body was putting way to much pressure on my hands. They were cold, and I couldn't feel if the fingers were moving.

"Yes it hurts!" I said, as it was suddenly important that he knew how much pain I was in. Even my voice hurt. My throat was dry. I lipped my lips and found they tasted like blood. I bet I looked like a real mess.

"_Good!"_ he said. His voice echoed. _Warehouse,_ I thought immediately,_ I'm inside a warehouse, on a rack, with a psychopath, in the dead of the night._

"What do you want?" I said. For a second, I almost believed that if I just made him the damn necklace, he'd leave me alone.

"Want?" he echoed, "what do I want?" He hummed in thought. My eyes were adjusted enough to see him, a few feet front of me. He was standing in an exaggerated "thinking" pose, cradling his elbow with his left arm and touching his chin with the thumb and index finger of his right.

"_I want respect!"_ he suddenly exploded, yelling so loudly I felt my ears ringing in the slice following this outburst. I cringed. "I want a little recognition, is that so much to ask?!" he walked up to me ands poke through his teeth. "_Is it?"_

"No!" I said quickly, wishing I could simply wither away. I had seen so many pictures of him, and yet, seeing him up close, he was something different. He was loud, he was explosive, he made exaggerated, broad gestures when he walked, when he moved...like a monkey. His face was framed by a curtain of green dread locks, ranging from lime-green streaks to forest green. When he stared me in the face, I could see the pale skin, not paint.

"Of course not!" he yelled angrily, slamming his hands down on either side of my head. It was a horrible thing to not be able to, at the very least, hide my face. I turned my head as far as I could but I could still hear him breathing, and his stare was boring a hole through me.

I was so terrified, I couldn't even cry. I could only try to hold onto the thoughts whirling in my head. I needed to keep a clear head. I've seen a million TV shows about hostage situations, and as long as I just cooperated, agreed, and didn't ask questions, he'd back off. So I said nothing. He stepped away from me and turned his back, holding his hands behind him casually.

I was in a warehouse...one filled with giant toys. A rack of colorful clothing was pushed off to the side. A cart of bottles and jars sat next to it. I could recognize a few tanks of helium, half covered in a blue tarp a little further off. Besides that, the only other things I could see where vague shapes where the hanging lamps cast their lights.

The Joker whirled back suddenly. "I've been watching you," he said, "and I gotta say, kiddo, you have _not_ been making yourself very popular for those of us who are _just_ tryin to have a little fun, eh?" his tone went from anger to amusement, in the same sentence. He was suddenly grinning, stretching it almost outside of the boundaries of his skull. It was a pretty grotesque smile. I found it scarier than the Joker himself.

"So," he said, now speaking as though he was doing me a favor, "I'm gonna give you a chance to redeem yourself. I'm gonna let YOU pass the message along to all of Gotham!" He raised his arms and gestured toward the black, infinite ceiling and laughed in that high pitched, hyena way of his.

"By the way," he said, suddenly serious, "how old are ya, kid?"

"N-nineteen," I stammered. My arms were numb again, which was a relief from the tingling sting.

He frowned, closing his eyebrows, or where he eyebrows light have been, had he any, over his eyes.

"You're a lot older than ya look, kid." He said ominously. The smile crept back into the corners of his mouth. "Don't matter though...ain't gonna kill the messenger, _are we_?"

* * *

_Yeay!_


	3. Joy Ride

Yeay!

* * *

"I said, _hold still!"_

I tried not to squirm, but he was making it very difficult. My eyes were watering heavily and making greasepaint application hard. Even though he seemed to have enough practice with this, utilizing his whole hand and not just the fingertips, he still managed to poke me in the eyes. I felt the makeup coating my eyeballs and I was just trying to blink out the tears. Unfortunately, I was also shaking and trying to relieve the pressure on my ribcage. The straps holding me around the chest were beginning to chafe my sides.

I was also being painted up like a clown.

He had started with a coat of white paint, high grade stuff too, not the cheap Halloween-y junk you could get at the drugstore. It smelled a little like metal and chemicals. It stung when it went into my eyes, though that could just be because the Joker had ragged nails.

The "holding still" was proving impossible when he got to my eyes; whatever his intention was, when I shook my head for the 3rd time, he growled at me and threw the jar of the red paint he was using. I took the few seconds to stretch out my mouth and neck.

"Har-_ley!"_ he suddenly screamed into the blackness. His harsh voice echoed around the vast warehouse.

"_What?!"_ A high pitched female voice echoed from nowhere. It wasn't a question; it was an angry response that ended in a squeal that rang in my ears. If I could have turned my head, I might have seen her standing on the catwalk somewhere above and behind us.

"Bring Daddy his pills!" The Joker commanded cheerfully. He waited a few seconds, back to me, staring off into the distance, and then turned to me, grinning.

A patter of feet attracted his attention away from me for a second. Another person, a small, thin waif of a girl walked into the light, dressed in a black and red costume. She even had on those ridiculous hats that some people wear when they ski or snowboard...those jester hats with the multiple pointed tops flopping out of them, with little balls on the end. When she moved her head, I could hear the very faint sound of jingling. The balls at the end of her hat were tiny bells.

She was carrying a box with her, one of those fishing cases. This one was painted in bight colors, and the top had a decal with the logo of one of the brands of Joker's pills on it. It was a cartoonish version of the Joker himself, though someone had painted glasses and a curly mustache on it.

"Ya don't hafta yell, Pud'in," said the girl in a slightly saddened voice, setting the box down on the table he had been using to hold the jars of white paint, "I could hear ya all the way across the factory."

He ignored her and set his hands down on the box. He had removed one of his fingerless gloves to avoid getting paint on it. He used this hand to open the case.

I didn't have to see inside, I knew what he was going for. My arms were numb, my legs were numb, my chest was on fire, my hair had been viciously tied back with a rubber band (I could still feel the tingling of my hair being pulled), and my face was covered in a thick layer of clown makeup. My attempts at conversation, or pleading, or begging, had been ignored completely. Even when I started crying, he just kept on smiling.

Now he was humming. He picked up a small medicine case, those roundish, amber colored tubes, and popped it open. He spilled a number of small, round purple-and-green pills into his hand. The girl was looking at them with interest, or as much interest as someone in a mask could possibly convey.

"I'm not gonna eat those," I said. Both the Joker and the girl looked up at me when I said it. Neither of them were smiling. My voice was raspy and labored, and talking hurt. The Joker's grinned at me, and then pinched my nose so hard I felt it crack.

I tried to hold my breath as long as possible, but after a few seconds I could already feel the pressure in my chest. I pressed my lips together and tried to mentally imagine the air in my lungs.

"Sooner or later, kiddo," he said in an almost cheerful voice, "you're going to either open your mouth, or pass out. Or, I'll pry it open."

I squeezed my eyes shut. I tasted the oily, metallic greasepaint in my mouth.

"Ha," Joker said, still pinching my nose, "30 seconds. Not bad, kiddo." He grinned at me. "But what if...?"

And then I burst out with a yelp when he unexpectedly tickled my ribs with his free hand. I was, still am, highly, highly ticklish. In fact, he could have merely wiggled his fingers in the air next to my ribs and I'd have laughed.

The fraction of a second my lips parted, he crammed the pill nearly down my esophagus and slapped his hand over my mouth. I felt the pill dissolve instantly. The grimy pieces began to slide further, and I fought back on my swallowing reflex. At least he had let go of my nose.

I didn't mean to, but I swallowed. It was bitter, and had that weird aftertaste of tiny sour fragments that coated my tongue. I tried spitting them out, but while I was busy coughing, the Joker had turned and picked up a spray bottle. When I opened my mouth and stuck my tongue out, he sprayed a stream of seltzer water directly into my throat.

And then I was on the ground.

"Whoops," said the black and red jester girl he'd sent down with his tackle-box of drugs, "Sorry!" I heard her soft footsteps coming around the side of the table, when she had pulled whatever lever or pushed whatever button it was that forced open all the restraints. I hit the ground face first, and felt another, absolutely agonizing wave of pain crash through my nose. I felt a fresh, warm torrent of blood gush.

"So much for the makeup," the Joker said darkly, standing over me with a thoughtful, devious look on his face. The jester girl helped me to my knees, carefully applying a handkerchief to my face. I felt the greasepaint come off around my nose, and when I looked into the cloth, I saw the blood and the blue paint from around my mouth.

"Ow," I said, unable to think of anything else to say. Now I tasted that annoying, gritty sour taste of the pills and the metallic taste of blood on my tongue. My arms were too weak to actually hold the napkin up, and so I let them drop to my sides and instead tipped my head back to stop the bleeding. I heard that it wasn't a good thing to do to stop bleeding, because of the risk that too much blood would enter my stomach and I'd puke it up, but I wasn't horrible concerned about that. In fact, the more I thought about it, the better it was that I did hork up the contents of my stomach.

"Harley," he said after a few seconds, "find us something more comfortable to slip into, hmm?"

"How about a gorilla suit?" she said from a distance now, and I heard the clattering of wire hangers echoing.

"Try again. Something...something more classy."

"Mmm..." she hummed in concentration, clanking more hangers. I sat back on my knees and let my head loll forward. The lighters were hurting my eyes anyway.

"How about this?"

"Something less... yellow."

"Yellow's not my color," I said faintly.

"Yellows not her color," The Joker repeated. Harley shuffled through more hangers. I could hear the fabric rustling. In fact, I hear a lot of noises that I hadn't noticed before. I heard the vague echoes of the various creaks and groans of the warehouse beams; I heard two, no three, different breathing patterns. I heard my heart thudding calmly. Then quicker. I could actually feel and hear it speed up so slightly, like a flutter.

"Okay okay, this one?"

"It's cute," the Joker said, his voice oddly echo-y and slow, "quite a charming little outfit for you, wouldn't you agree?" He asked me, I think. Harley must have handed it to him because suddenly, he was holding up a sequenced dress thing; it was colorful, and shiny. So shiny...it was glinting like nothing I'd ever seen before. I had to touch it to make sure it was real. It looked like a living rainbow.

"You like it?" he asked again slowly, his voice taking on a drawl.

"Wow-ee," I said, my own voice sounding odd to me, "that is one sparkly piece of leotard."

He laughed. It was one of his booming, maniacal laughs and the funniest thing I had ever heard in my life. I felt a bubble of pressure in my chest work its way up to my throat, then it burst out of me like a spray of light. Or something. His laugh wasn't scary at all, I had no clue why I had thought that. In fact, it sounded like joy and happiness. It was liking drinking unicorn giggles, like on that site I read once that was also funny and made me laugh, but nothing had ever had me laugh like he did. He really was a funny guy, he really was THE Joker, not just some crazy guy with green dreads. He was like...the Prince of Laughter.

So I started laughing uncontrollably. Violently. I couldn't stop. It was magical, the way they both moved. Slow, and I could see the trail left by their movements, like the Bionic guy. In fact, I even traced Harley stride across the beam of light, holding my leotard, and made the Bionic-man-moving sound with my mouth.

"Ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-cha," I said.

The next thing I know, I'm laying on my back, facing up into the night sky. I was also moving. In fact, I was moving and rumbling, and shaking slightly. I was vibrating.

I sat up carefully. My head had been, apparently, on Harley's lap, because when I sat up, I was sitting sideways in the back seat of a car. The top of the car was open to the night air and my hair whipped around my face. I could see snakes of green sliding and slithering in front of me, so I grab one. The snake when limp and instead, a cold, hard hand closed around my fingers and wrenched them from the snake I had apparently just killed.

"No hair pulling," said the laughing voice to me. Oh, was the snake alive then? Was it angry with me? Do snakes have hair? _Oh,_ I told myself, _the snake IS the hair._ I had tugged on one of the Joker's dreads, it wasn't a snake at all.

"Back up, sweetie," said Harley, "and put on a seatbelt, okay suga'? Mista J idn't exactly driver of the year."

"Oh," I said, leaning forward so he could hear me, "me either. I go through reds all the time. Sometimes, they're really yellow but they don't believe me when I tell them so. It's the lights, they change and get me in trouble," I paused and tried to remember why I was talking about lights.

The city at night was amazing. I mean, they tell you all the time how drugs are bad for you because they alter your state of mind, but gosh, do they ever pretty things up. Gotham didn't have the lights of Vegas normally, but it did now. Each building had an amazing glow to it, like it was light up from the inside by fire, or fireworks. They sped past me like a meter.

"Red lights ARE a pain," said the Joker, "lets get rid of'em." He threw something then, from his hand at the traffic light we were speeding through. The lights did the most amazing thing, exploding into a cloud of light and magic. I started laughing again, hysterically, when the heat from the flames brushed my face. It was so spectacular, I wished that everyone could see what I saw.

"Turn up the radio," I said suddenly, taking a breath from my near-sobbing laugh, "play something."

Obligingly, Joker twisted the knob on the radio and a sound filled the car. I didn't know the song title yet, but I knew the words to it. I started to sing, loudly. I launched myself forward closer to the speakers. We were going fast. Very fast. So fast then when he spun the wheel, I fell on top of Harley like a load of bricks, unsure of what had happened to me.

"Hey, I said seatbelt!" Harley said with only a vague irritability.

"I love this song," I said, "I love it with all my soul." I leaned forward again, this time hopping over the seat and landing, somewhat awkwardly, in the front passenger seat.

"Kiddo," said the Joker darkly, "you're beginning to get on my nerves."

I laughed at him; he had the funniest voice. Everything he said was a hysterical punchline.

The car twisted again, and I was thrown like a doll around the front seat. The Joker had to keep one hand on my shoulder to keep me from taking him down when he made a sharp right turn, which must have been tricky while making said turn. He growled something and Harley finally had to restrain me with my seat belt.

"Hey, kiddo," he said to me after a second, while I chuckled softly to myself, "are you happy?"

"As a clam."

"Would you like to be more happy?"

"Like more clams?"

"Lots more."

"Ohmph," I said, opening and closing my mouth as if eating the air. He laughed strangely, demonically almost, and I felt like I was coming down now...but I took the pill Harley had pulled from the seat dividers and popped it into my mouth, letting the bitter dissolve into a sour coating.

It came quicker now. He passed me something after a few moments, while I marveled at the passing scenery.

"Throw," he commanded. I threw and watched it explode against the pavement, sending out beautiful sparks.

And then it went black. The car jerked. I heard the Joker curse, a really bad word. I heard Harley squeal. I saw something big and black in front of me, right there on the hood of the car. I willed time to slow so I could get a good look at it. I squinted my eyes, concentrating, but it was difficult.

It was big, really big, with glowing eyes and a mouth full of teeth. It blinked at me and I realized it was alive. Then the car spun on all four wheels. A series of loud bangs, close to my ears, went off, and I clapped my hands over them to protect them. The smell of smoke filled my mouth. I started laughing. I was still laughing when the car came to a halt so suddenly that my head banged forward on the dash board. I felt my head crack, and a burning, and then warmth, and then just the sound of me laughing.

I was pulled out a few moments later, with tears streaming down my face, my throat raw from laughter, my chest on fire. The big black thing was dragging me out like a cat dragging a mouse. I giggled gleefully when it dragged me upright.

"Are you alright?" it asked me in a deep, rumbling voice. I could see the vibrating airwaves the voice left, like ripples, or shock waves. I watched them in fascination.

"Wow," I said faintly, "wow, you're...you're...you're really big," I said finally, unable to express my joy. It WAS large as all heck, and for a second, I thought maybe it was night.

"Are you the night? Cuz you're like...you're night."

"Sort of," it said to me, letting go of my arms. I swayed on the spot but stayed up.

"I like it," I said finally. It grabbed my arm again, pulling it out in front of me, "it's so dark. Like night." I felt a tiny sting when it swept a black hand over my shoulder.

Almost instantly, I felt myself crash.

I was sitting amid a tangle of what was left of a purple car (judging by the large twisted piece of purple metal to my left), bleeding from various points of my body. My head ached badly. My back was throbbing. My leg was scraped and burning from my knee down. I saw the faint glitter of the leotard I was wearing over my jeans and t-shirt, torn beyond recognition.

The black thing came into focus. It was now wiping a burning cloth across my forehead. I smelled the mild scent of alcohol.

"Are you sober now?" it, he, asked me in a deadpan voice.

"Yes," I said sadly, "I'm...I'm not gonna die am I?" I twisted my head away when he pressed too hard. He merely waited for me to stop squirming before he applied another liberally soaked cloth of burning fluid to my face.

"Not tonight." He said curtly.

"I'm going to hurl," I told him, feeling extreme nausea rise in my lower half. I swallowed painfully.

"Probably for the best." I heard sirens. He heard them too. I twisted around, uncomfortably, and saw the street with pieces of bumper all over it. Across the street, the Joker sat on the curb. He was glaring at me with such intensity, for a second I was sure he was going to actually fly up into the air and attack me.

"He...I...I just..." I couldn't find the right words to express my horror this time.

"Don't worry," said the Batman himself, "it was a small dose, its not going to permanently harm you. Just try and keep off your feet for a few days." He spoke carefully, slowly, calculatingly. His voice has a weird sort of sinister quality to it, a growl underneath each word that wasn't a growl per say... but it was as equally intimidating as the Joker's laughter. I shivered and almost missed what he was saying.

"...can take you to the hospital when it arrives. Can you stand?"

I couldn't. I just sat and stared at my shoes, drawing my knees up.

"What's your name?"

I felt tears burn my eyes again. I wasn't laughing this time.

"Do you remember your name? Where you live?" He was kneeling and speaking carefully so that'd Id understand, but the dizzy hysteria was being replaced by a crushing sort of depression, and when he spoke I only heard accusations. I was sure he was angry at me. I felt he wanted to just break my neck right there.

He stood to leave and I grabbed the bottom of his cape and clutched it as hard as I could.

"Don't leave," I said, "I know you hate me and I promise to never ever leave me house again and I'll do anything you tell me to do, _just don't leave me alone with him!"_

"I'm not leaving," he said, "but I can't help you anymore either. The police will be here soon enough."

"What are you telling her?" the Joker's voice rose above the quiet growl of the Batman's voice echoing in my head, "don't lie. I'll get her eventually, Batsy!" He laughed hysterically.

The police cruisers screeched around the corner. I felt the slick material slid through my fingers. When I looked again, the Batman was gone, and the street was lit up with a dozen blinking police lights.

* * *

_OMG! where's Harley? Exploded thats what._


	4. Inexplicable Dream Logic

_No, Harley didn't die, I wouldnt kill off a canon character unless they died, you know...canon-ly. I was joshin'._

_This one is more as development than actual action, (that's next chapter), but I had fun writing it so...enjoy. _

* * *

"I _really_ don't feel good," I whined, hugging the tan trench coat tighter to myself. "I seriously may puke all over this table."

The policeman smiled sadly at me.

"Do you want another cup then?"

They had been giving me cups of ginger ale to settle my stomach, though it wasn't helping. They even went as far as to send some errand boy to fetch some REAL ginger ale, with the ginger still in it. It burned my tongue when I drank it. I found it actually really comforting and soothing. But my stomach still churned and growled uncomfortably.

"No," I said in a defeated voice, "I've had enough, thank you." I really, really wanted to just hurl and get it over with. I've had a few close calls where Id run into their bathroom and sat in front of the toilet on the floor, not even caring about the sanitation, or lack thereof, of the toilet itself. I just wanted to expel whatever was making my stomach want to die. I tired sticking my finger down my throat but all I did was gag. I never could make myself puke.

"Can we start from the beginning?" the cop asked me quietly, almost painfully. I had told them the story at least 30 times in the last 4 hours, yet they continued to ask me the same questions over and over, as if they thought they could glean some hidden, tiny but important detail from my story. I simply couldn't tell them anything new anymore. I could repeat my entire story word for word now each time. The pleading tone in his accented voice wasn't bringing up any latent information, if that's what he was after.

"Right." I sighed and sank deeper into the blanket the nice cop had given me some time before, when I complained about the cold. These guys weren't dumb. They were highly trained, and highly organized people who were genuinely concerned about doing a thorough job. I really understood what they were trying to do...but it didn't stop the whine of irritation that came into my voice when they asked me the same question I had heard a dozen times before.

"No," I said firmly, "there wasn't anything around me that gave me any clue whatsoever about my location. It looked like a party on the inside, with balloons, and no, I couldn't read the tanks, and yes, they were generic balloons with no logos. The jars of greasepaint had no labels either. It was a generic warehouse with broken glass windows, of which the patterns I can't remember in the slightest. They could have even been whole, for all I know. There was no indication of an address or anything. No numbers. No words written anywhere. Just piles of stuffed animals and a rack of costumes, again with no labels."

They took blood samples to pinpoint exactly which brand of pills I had taken. Apparently, the differing brands had slightly altered ratios of Joker gas and other psychedelic drugs. No kidding, I saw rainbows on everything I had laid my eyes on. Humorous rainbows.

The cop rubbed at the bridge of his nose wearily, either making a show of being as tired as me to gain some sympathy and likewise, any information I hadn't told them yet, or because he too, was genuinely exhausted. Though, I'd like to think that I had the more exhausting night, and I wasn't complaining about it yet. I was trying to be a trooper.

"So, he didn't hurt you? He didn't touch you in anyway?"

"Aside from breaking my face?"

He gave me a silent yet significant look. I felt another wave of nausea, this time from the implication. I shook my head in horror. Already, horrible images were invading my mind and I was so close to finally just tossing my lunch...

"And the girl clown you saw? Harley? Did she take off her mask at any point?"

"No."

"She didn't mention any places? Any names? Any...intent of action?"

"No, no and no."

This went on for another hour and a half, and finally, the cop, Leon as he asked me to call him, Detective Leon, stood up and stretched.

"Alright," he said in a final tone, "I think we have all the information you can give us then." I tipped my head back and heaved an obvious sigh. "if there's anything you remember later, any little, insignificant thing at all, please give us a c ---"

He didn't get to finish. The door to the "interrogation room" burst open, and a younger looking cop with blond hair and serious eyes swept in. He looked at me for a fraction of a second, then whispered something in Detective Leon's ear. Leon's face fell, though when the blond cop backed off, he had composed his face into an emotionless mask. My heart sank.

"Ah, it would appear that the uh...the suspect has...ah, been misplaced." He spoke carefully, and slowly, and delicately.

"Misplaced," I echoed tonelessly, "the suspect has been misplaced." He spoke of the Joker like he was the lost remote to the television.

"It would be advisable if, ah, you stay in our custody for the time being until we, ah, clear this situation up."

"The Joker is officially out of your control," I said, still deadpan, "and he's currently running through the streets." I gave Leon a hard look. "Are you kidding me? I demand to be put into the witness protection program."

000

I had a dream later. I dreamt that I was back in the Joker's car, only it wasn't just a car anymore; it was the Joker himself, he had just turned into the car. Inexplicable dream logic.

I was strapped into the front seat, and I couldn't undo my seatbelt. I tried, but the button kept moving to various parts of the buckle, and I couldn't pinpoint exactly where it was.

Batman was driving. Or, a weird, dream-logic Batman with a long green tongue. I turned to see him grinning like a crazed lunatic at me, with his tongue hanging out and slithering almost, like the snakes I thought I saw that were actually Joker's hair. He was driving psychotically, twisting and turning, sliding the car all over the streets and each turn, I thought the car would just drift off the road and into the walls or guardrails, where I somehow _knew_ that it would explode into a fireball and I'd die.

The worst part was that the road we were on was kind of hilly, and he sped up every time he was going up the hill, and then the car would shoot up into the air and my stomach would drop like I was on a rollercoaster, dozens of feet over the night-time, yellow, glowing city. We would hang in the air for a second and I contemplated by impending doom. I thought each impact was going to kill me, but the car just landed and continued driving over more hills.

And I was getting sicker. In fact, just _looking_ at dream-Batman made me more nauseous by the second. I knew that it was HIM who was somehow making me feel like this, and I had to get out of the car or I'd keep being sick.

I woke up when I had rolled off the bench I had dozed off on and hit the floor, hard. I saw the faces of concerned policemen behind their desks rise to help me, but I just got up and ran into the bathroom, where I puked up an old sandwich and a few cups of ginger ale.

0000

The next night I was on my own. Leon had offered to drive me home, which I excepted when I realized that I couldn't live at the station until the Joker was caught again.

"We'll, of course, be patrolling the area 24/7, and I'll even park in the driveway behind the complex for the next few nights. If you need help, we'll set up an alarm system, okay? You flicker the lights and I'll be the first one up there to get you. You understand?"

I nodded miserably.

Leon stopped the car in front of my apartments. As I slid out, he leaned back and whispered to me.

"Truth is," he said, "I'd expect that we're not the only one's who'll be watching for your safety. I'll bet my badge that you'll have the Bat hovering around your window for a while to come. If there's any one you'd want to be on the lookout, it'd be him." He winked at me and then backed into my driveway, while I stepped up into the cheerful hallway of my apartment.

I lived on the second floor, no too far off the ground that I could potentially jump from the fire escape, and if I tuck and roll, I _may _make it without shattering both kneecaps.

When I got inside my own kitchen, breathing in the faint smells of incense and plaster (from my new door), and the dust, and that particular scent you create just by living in the same place long enough, made me feel more vulnerable than before. My little niche in Gotham had been violated, violently (haha) and there was literally no place to go.

My only comfort was the police cruiser below, and then, when I passed my window, the dark, still silhouette on the building next door's fire escape that was unmistakably Batman himself. He was gone in a flash of course, even before I leaned out the window to get a better look, but I had no doubt at all that he'd let me see him, intentionally, just for peace of mind if nothing else.

I took a shower, and was in my jammies and asleep in just 15 minutes.


End file.
